


and she means everything to me

by umbrellabirds



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/F, I know I KNOW, Pining, Possibly Unrequited Love, bi keyleth, mentioned vax/keyleth, will add more tags in future installments, yeah the title is from that dodie song
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-27
Updated: 2020-06-27
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:14:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,729
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24951394
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/umbrellabirds/pseuds/umbrellabirds
Summary: Various characters being a little (or a lot) in love with Vex. It's what she deserves.
Relationships: Keyleth/Vex'ahlia (Critical Role)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 50





	and she means everything to me

**Author's Note:**

> Tags will be updating as more chapters are added! Thank you to @ adriiadventures (tumblr/ao3) and @ dancer4813 (twitter/tumblr/ao3) for beta reading this!! 
> 
> kudos and especially comments are much appreciated <3 <3

The warm afternoon began to cool as Vox Machina settled down for the night. Tentpoles clattered out of the Bag of Holding, rocks and firewood were stacked in a circle, wounds were patched up, weapons were sharpened.

“Keyleth!” shouted Vex. “Keyleth, come help me get some water. We’re making stew tonight.”

Keyleth, who had been trying to convince a skittish butterfly to land on her finger, snapped to attention. “Yeah, sure! Yeah!” 

Vex, carrying three buckets by the handle, set off from their campsite without waiting, and Keyleth stumbled to catch up. An armorless Trinket lumbered along by Vex’s side, and Keyleth submerged her hands in his voluminous fur. “Who’s a good bear?” she cooed at him. “Who’s a good naked bear? Hey, hey, you could say he’s bear naked.”

Vex actually laughed, even though it was a joke someone managed to come up with nearly every day when Trinket’s armor was taken off. 

Keyleth had scouted the area as Minxie before they had chosen it for a campsite, and thus knew exactly where the little stream where Vex intended to source water from was located. She was, however, significantly taller, ganglier, and less graceful in her natural half-elven form, and spent a lot of time ducking branches. 

“What do you need me for?” she managed, tugging a blackberry bramble from her long, wild hair. “Trinket should be able to carry enough, even for Grog.”

“Oh,” said Vex. “I just wanted to spend some time with you. I feel like we haven’t talked recently.”

Keyleth decided not to interrogate the warm fluttering in her stomach at the implied alone.

“Oh, cool. That’s cool.”

There was a moment of awkward silence that Vex broke. “That move you pulled in the last fight was amazing.”

Keyleth gave a shy grin. “It was okay. I’m sure they were just caught off guard by the entire concept of their carthorse turning against them.”

“Like I said, amazing.”

“I was just lucky-”

“No, you’re amazing and powerful and brilliant and lucky, and--careful, there!”

Keyleth, her face on fire and completely distracted, had nearly taken a walk off the riverbank entirely. Her raised foot hung in the air above a deep pool and she tottered backward. Vex took her by the shoulders.

“We’re trying to bring the water back in buckets, not in our clothes.”

“Heh, sorry,” said Keyleth, and she took an empty bucket from Vex. It had a strange residue, and Keyleth had a nasty feeling it had been host to some unpleasant substances (zombie remains?) while in the Bag of Holding. She kneeled at the bank, took a handful of grass and tried to scrub it clean. She heard Vex kneel next to her and take out the two other buckets and fuss with them. The stuff inside came off easily, but looked seriously gross, and Keyleth turned her gaze to Vex’ahlia instead.

She looked a lot like her brother, it was true. They had the same smooth brown skin, the same sharp face, the same dark, flashing eyes, the same loose, glossy black curls, though Vax usually passed a hot comb through his hair to straighten it in the morning. Made it more manageable, he said. As a consequence, Vex’s hair always looked a little more unruly, despite being kept in that long, thick, omnipresent braid that was, at the moment, threatening to drag in the water. 

There were some differences in the face, too--though there was a softening effect in the golden, dappled afternoon light that passed through the boughs of the draping willows to glow on her face, Vex’s features were slightly but unmistakably rounder, her jaw just a little less defined, her lips just a touch fuller. Her shoulders had a little more muscle, her body more--Keyleth blushed as her eyes drifted down the neck of Vex’s shirt, open over her cleavage--curve. 

Not that Keyleth didn’t find Vax pretty, because she did, but Vex was pretty in ways he wasn’t, ways she felt embarrassed to notice now that she was dating her brother, ways that just made her feel-

“You alright, darling?” said Vex, amused. “Do I have something on my shirt?”

“N-no,” Keyleth stammered. “I was just, uh, I was thinking that’s such a pretty necklace. Where’d you get it? That’s new, right?”

“It is new,” said Vex, suddenly quite cheery. “Those highwaymen must have robbed someone quite rich before they tried their hand on us. It’s a real sapphire.”

“Nice. They’re pretty. It’s pretty, I mean.”

“Thank you! Is your bucket clean yet?”

“Huh? Oh yeah, the bucket.” She had been scrubbing it very absently for some minutes, and certain places were much cleaner than others. “Just a couple of spots.” She dunked it under the water, accidentally splashing Vex, who gave a theatrical gasp.

“Keyleth!”

“Oops, sorry, sorry-” but she was cut off when Vex threw a cupped handful of water at her face. Keyleth gaped at her, blinking water out of her eyes. Vex winked. 

“Alright,” said Keyleth. “It’s on.”

She cast Control Water, causing a jet of creek water to shoot out and hit Vex from behind. Vex, dripping, dashed the nearest bucket through the water and tossed the contents over Keyleth, soaking her. Keyleth gasped as the cold water hit her and ran towards Vex, giving her a solid shove into the pool. Vex gave a cry that was half laughter, half shock as she toppled backwards, clutching at Keyleth’s shirt. She fell backwards, taking Keyleth with her in a splash.

The pool was cold but clear, and it was all Keyleth could do not to take in a shocked gulp before surfacing. Vex’s hands had released themselves from her shirt, and now rested on her shoulders as the two of them tread water. Her mouth was a perfect O of surprise, and her hair had come loose from its braid and was plastered all over her face. She burst into spluttering laughter, tipping her chin upwards to not inhale water, and Keyleth couldn’t help but join in.

“Wait, wait,” Keyleth choked out. “It’s not even that deep, I can feel the bottom,” and this revelation made her laugh even more.

“Maybe you can,” gasped Vex. “I’m short! I can’t reach the--don’t you laugh at my misfortune, Keyleth!”

“I’m not laughing at you!”

“Yes you are!”

Keyleth dunked her, and she came up spitting her hair out of her face. “Maybe I am.”

Vex put her hands on the back of Keyleth’s head and pulled her face into the water until Keyleth slapped her arm in surrender. 

“Alright, alright,” she said when Vex let her come up again. “You win.”

“Let that be a lesson to you,” said Vex, her arms still around Keyleth’s neck. “Don’t compete in a splash fight with someone who grew up with Vax.”

Keyleth just grinned at her.

“Help me up, Keyleth.”

Keyleth hoisted her out of the pool by the waist, then accepted her outstretched hand and let Vex pull her out. 

“Of course,” she said, “I could have won easily if I had decided to take water-breathing this morning-”

Vex seized her by her sopping front and pulled her nearly a foot down to meet her eyes. 

“I meant, you won fair and square,” said Keyleth.

“Damn right,” said Vex. Their faces were very close together, and Keyleth’s mouth twisted, trying to remain serious. Vex smiled at her. “I love you, Keyleth,” she said.

“I love you too,” said Keyleth, suddenly breathless, and her own words hit her like a strike of lightning.

Vex let her go with a grin. “You think you’re talking to my brother, now, don’t you.” It wasn’t a question. She said it like an immutable fact. 

Keyleth stood back up, blushing again. “Of course I don’t, I mean, Vax is cool and I love him, but you’re cool in--in your own way. I mean, you’re so confident and strong and nothing bothers you and…” but Vex looked away, and then back to her, and there was something slightly sad in her dark eyes. 

“Thank you, Keyleth. You’re not so bad yourself. Now, where’s Trinket gone off to?”

Keyleth stared as she walked away, stunned. There had been no change in her friendliness, in the warmth in her voice, but where the instant before there had been such an electric closeness, there was suddenly a yawning distance between them. Just a second ago she had been about to steel herself to lean in and… but now that seemed as impossible as it had half an hour before. 

“Oh, hello Trinket!” she heard Vex say, as if far off. “You caught a fish! Keyleth, look, he caught a fish!”

Keyleth focused her eyes on the approaching bear, who, indeed, held a flapping trout between his jaws.

“We need to add this to our stew,” said Vex, looking proudly at Trinket. 

“That sounds great,” said Keyleth numbly.

“Are you alright, Kiki?” asked Vex, a little frown marked between her brows.

Keyleth gave her a grin. “Of course! I’m just a little tired, y’know, from fighting and then with falling in back there. And everything.”

“Of course,” said Vex, but she didn’t seem quite convinced.

Keyleth filled her bucket and began to walk back to camp, each step sounding sloshy. “I’m so wet,” she complained. Vex snorted at that, and Keyleth did too, though she didn’t understand what was funny. 

“Let’s ride on Trinket, dear, it’ll be much more fun that way. And warmer.”

Keyleth gave a nod of assent and hopped on Trinket’s back. Vex handed her the buckets one by one before climbing up herself, in front of Keyleth.

Trinket’s lumbering walk carried them quickly back to camp. The regular, shifting rhythm would have been soothing in any other circumstance, but she couldn’t stop the seizing feeling in her stomach every time her gaze lingered too long on Vex, who was an unavoidable sight pressed close to her. Even after they got back to camp, and had changed into dry clothes, after they had given half the fish to Trinket and cooked the rest, and after they had all sat around the campfire and talked and laughed together, Keyleth couldn’t banish that ache in her chest. And though she was sitting right next to her, she tried not to look at Vex. It hurt too much.


End file.
